Oven appliances are frequently utilized in a variety of settings to cook food items. During operation of an oven appliance, relatively high temperatures can be generated, for example, in the cooking chamber or on the cooktop of the oven appliance. These high temperatures can affect the ambient temperatures surrounding the various electronic controls of the oven appliance. For example, when the oven appliance is operating in a cooking mode, such temperatures can range from 50 degrees Celsius (“° C.”) to 85° C. Further, during a self-clean cycle, the heating elements in the cooking chamber can generate heat such that ambient temperatures of the various electronic controls can reach extremely high levels, such as up to 105° C.
Many modern oven appliances include a user interface panel that allows a user to interact with the oven appliance to, for example, turn the appliance on, adjust temperatures of the appliance, set built-in timers, etc. Further, touchscreens for use with user interface panels have recently increased in popularity.
The current approach to developing touchscreens for oven appliances has been to avoid the use of resistive touch screens. Resistive touchscreens are susceptible to changes in resistivity measurements due to temperature fluctuations, thus leading to inaccuracies in the touchscreen feedback and communication. The wide range of temperatures that oven appliances experience has thus previously made resistive touchscreens undesirable for use with oven appliances.
Accordingly, many currently known oven appliances utilize capacitive touchscreens. Capacitive touchscreens are not as susceptible to inaccuracies due to temperature fluctuations, and have thus been considered better suited for oven appliance applications. However, capacitive touchscreen technology is relatively expensive, leading to such touchscreen technology only being utilized in higher end oven appliance models.
Accordingly, improved oven appliances and methods for operating oven appliance are desired. In particular, oven appliance and methods which utilize affordable and accurate touchscreen technology would be advantageous.